Credits

Description

Tam is a low-rent private eye in Bangkok’s Chinatown. The business that drifts into his shabby office, when there is any, is generally in the domain of straying dogs and husbands until his drinking buddy Lung shows up, spooked as hell, with a very strange job for Tam. Lung claims a nameless woman seeks to kill him, and all he can give Tam to work with is a photo. The detective’s snooping puts him on the trail of Ming, who he finds soon enough—two days dead by hanging! Ming’s isn’t the last ghastly death that the case will dump in the lap of Tam, who’s haunted by the mystery of his parents’ disappearance in his childhood—and maybe more than that…

With a lighter touch than his urban thrillers and horror films, though it certainly incorporates dimensions of both, THE DETECTIVE finds director Oxide Pang prowling the sweltering streets of his beloved Bangkok again, with his twin brother Danny co-producing. The border-hopping, task-trading Hong Kong duo exploded onto the Asian film scene with BANGKOK DANGEROUS and THE EYE, quickly establishing a reputation for their rich, gritty photography and edgy editing, white-knuckle shocks and slow-burning urban cool. Oxide’s eye for dense, gorgeously composed riots of urban dilapidation is in full effect here, and so is a pronounced wit, Pang’s clever jests adding flavour to the tension. Hong Kong heartthrob Aaron Kwok is thoroughly likeable as the bemused and confused Tam, and potato-faced character actor Shing Fui-On, a Hong Kong fixture for years, is an added prize, as is the particularly original and effective score peppered with a dash of retro-funky Thai pop music. Here’s a clue for you: THE DETECTIVE is a wickedly fun, subtly twisted film noir, not to be missed!